Rules of the Road
by wehaveaproblem
Summary: A normal Hogsmeade weekend takes a turn for the worse when Ron gets bitten by a homeless person and inadvertently starts a zombie apocalypse at Hogwarts. Fearing the worst, Dumbledore banishes Harry to an unknown land: Panem. As Harry tries to find his way back to Hogwarts, he ends up making a couple friends along the way.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: I'm really not sure how this story came into being, but I guess that the Hunger Games and Harry Potter do well in the middle of a zombie apocalypse... This also sort of has some elements of Zombieland, but you needn't have seen it to read this. Anyway, enjoy! Harry's definitely a little OC, but he was just too much fun to handle. _

* * *

**Rules of the Road- Chapter One:**

My name is Harry Potter, and this is my story.

A few weeks ago, I had it stuck in my deluded, naïve head that Hogwarts was the safest place in the entire world. With Dumbledore in charge, I thought nothing could ever go wrong. I was living an almost entirely sunny life of Hogwarts magic, thinking I was completely invincible. Boy, was I wrong about a lot of things.

So, I think it was three weeks ago exactly when my life took an odd turn. We were having a normal Hogsmeade weekend. Ron, Hermione, and I were walking down the bright path to the village without so much as a care in the world. It was warm, the sun was shining, and there was nothing in my way. We were almost to the first shop when things started to get a little weird. It went down a little something like this:

* * *

_Three weeks ago…_

"_So, where should we start?" Hermione asked. "I know I need a new quill, but we have all day so it doesn't really matter to me."_

"_Uh… I guess we could start at Honeyduke's," Ron suggested, ever distracted by his need for food._

"_Alright sure," Hermione replied._

_So we walked towards the candy shop. We were only about twenty feet from the entrance when we heard a strange shuffling from inside the alleyway. Upon looking, we discovered it was a deranged-looking, blood-covered Muggle making strange noises. We all gave the crazy person a wide berth and continued on our merry way towards the shop._

"_What do you reckon was going on there?" I asked._

_Ron shrugged, entirely unbothered. "Probably one of those nutters who loses it when they abuse their magic. My mum is always going on about them."_

"_Or he could just be homeless," Hermione suggested._

"_A homeless man covered in blood and mumbling to himself?" Ron challenged. "That's far-fetched."_

_Hermione gave Ron a glare, but that only lasted for a second because the nutter sprinted out of the alleyway and dove right at Ron. Before anything could be done, the crazy guy bit down on Ron's calf. Then Ron was like, "AHHHHHHHHHH!" And Hermione and I were like, "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" _

_And then Ron kicked the guy's nose in, and Hermione stunned him. For the next ten seconds, we were all silent, but then I saw that Ron's leg was gushing blood, and I hoisted him to his feet, and we started running back to the castle. _

_We got him to the hospital wing and told him we'd visit him later. Hermione and I went back to Hogsmeade for the rest of the day (still feeling carefree), and we did go back to visit him, but Madame Pompfrey said that he wasn't doing too well, so we'd have to come back later. So we went back to the dormitories and went to sleep._

_Long story short, the homeless man was a zombie, and Ron was running about the castle turning a bunch of students into zombies too. The next morning was complete pandemonium as everyone was running away from flesh-eating friends. I was sprinting around looking for a nice, safe closet to wait this out in, when Lavender Brown came flying out of an empty classroom and started chasing me._

_The next thing I knew, I was sprinting down the hall towards Dumbledore's office. I was about to turn a sharp corner to confuse Lavender when Dumbledore came out of his office and yelled something like, "SAVE THE CHOSEN ONE!" and threw a Portkey at me. The old can struck my temple, and suddenly everything went back._

So that's that. When I next opened my eyes, I was lying in a ditch by a highway in an unknown place. And that's where I've been ever since.

* * *

During my few weeks out here on my own, I've learned a few things.

First being, there are a lot of zombies— even here in this strange place Dumbledore banished me to. _Man_, are there a lot of zombies. I'll just be walking along, minding my own business, wondering where I can get some food, when one of them will spring out of a ditch and start chasing me…

Which leads me to my next point. Never don't kill a zombie.

You must always kill a zombie— especially if it's chasing you. Seriously. Don't play the noble, no-kill hero. You can't outrun a feral, killing machine, no matter how fast you think you are. The next zombie is always going to be faster and more rabid that the previous one, so kill this one while you can.

I've also discovered that _Avada Kedavra_ works very well on zombies. 'Nuff said.

And finally, don't pass up an opportunity for food. If a nice-looking old lady gets out of her old car and comes over to offer you her cooler because her grandson just bit her, don't hesitate to put a spell through her brain and take more than just her cooler because, seriously, no one else is on the road so even unlicensed drivers can get behind the wheel. It's also a nice bonus when it turns out that she has a Glock 9 in her trunk and a baseball bat in the passenger seat. Oh, and make sure you take care of the grandson before you drive off. Words of the wise…

Come to think of it, that old lady might have been the last live person I saw that wasn't running and screaming from a zombie, in the process of dying, or crying over their unfortunate ankle bite.

It's a little bit sad, if I think about it, but this whole experience of getting thrown into zombie territory has made me a little bit numb to sensible emotion.

So, long story short, the next three weeks passed as long, stretched out hours of me alternating between killing zombies on a mad spree and driving like a half-drunk maniac. I crashed Granny's car about a week into my adventure, so I've been on foot for quite a while now. The rest has just been the same: walk, kill zombies, run, eat, repeat.

Also, adding to my list of things I've learned: Glock 9s are surprising heavy when one is tired of walking. It's like carrying around a cement block in a cooler full of old lady food after you've run a marathon. Needless to say, I take breaks frequently.

* * *

All around me, there are forests for miles. I keep expecting a zombie to come sprinting out of the trees, and for me to finally get a chance to try out my shiny new Glock 9, but so far that hasn't happened. It's probably a good thing, considering I've never shot a gun, but there's always a first time for everything.

At some point, with the sun high above my head, I stop in the grass on the side of the road to eat my meager lunch of a packet of teddy grahams. I'm attempting to rip open the package when I hear a rumbling in the distance. I start to panic, thinking that it's, like, a hoard of zombies coming to kill me or something, but that's not what I see in the distance. It's that kind of hot and sunny when you look down a road and everything looks all wavy and blurry, but still, a recklessly driving black car doesn't look much like a hoard of zombies.

I throw my teddy grahams back into the rolling cooler and pull out my wand and Glock 9. Somehow, facing real, living humans is momentarily more terrifying than facing a zombie, simply because they might have the actual _intention_ of killing me.

I scramble to my feet, pulling my cooler with me, and take my position in the center of the deserted road, ready to fire with either weapon at any moment. The black vehicle comes tearing towards me with increasing speed, but I force myself to stay put. They'll know I'm not a zombie because I'm acting like a human, right? Or maybe I should move around to seem more living-like…?

The massive car comes into clear view and whips to a stop about twenty feet down the road from me. I tremble in my shoes, but I still hold my ground. _Come on, Harry, this is it… Are you the powerful zombie-hunter you've become or are you the weak boy that you were at the start?_

It's a giant, black Hummer, all shiny and glint-y in the afternoon sun. It's really a distractingly macho and amazing car when you think about it. How is it still all shiny and pretty after surviving zombies for a long extent of time? When I crashed Granny's car into that lake, it was pretty muddy, bloody, and dinged up…

My train of thought is cut off when the driver's door flies open. I grip the Glock with increasing strength and prepare to fire if fired upon.

A tall guy who appears to be around eighteen slams the door shut behind him and starts off towards me with a crossbow in hand. I see a significantly more powerful gun than my pitiful Glock 9 shoved in his pocket. He has dark hair, olive skin, and a strong build. I instantly feel intimidated by his strength. And that's even before he talks.

He gets about ten feet from me, and I think I'm visibly shaking. He scrutinizes me for a second and then whips the crossbow out in front of him, aiming at my head with cold-blooded composure. I make a fairly silent shrieking noise and bring my wand up to meet his arrow.

He raises an eyebrow at my wand, so he's obviously a Muggle. "You from the Capitol?" the guy asks across the short distance, gesturing at me with his crossbow. As he gets closer, I determine he's probably around 6' 4" or something ridiculous like that.

I answer in complete honesty, considering I have no idea where or what the Capitol is. "No," I say. My voice audibly shakes like the rest of my body.

He seems somewhat satisfied with my answer, but he doesn't lower the crossbow. "Then where _are_ you from, kid? Six?"

I'm puzzled by the places he's talking about. "No… I'm from London," I reply.

"London?" he asks. "Where's that?"

"England," I supply.

"The hell it is," he mutters mostly to himself. His stormy grey eyes flash with anger and frustration. "I swear, if you're from the Capitol, I'm going to blow you sky high…"

"I'm not, I promise!" I say, throwing my hands up in terror. "I swear to you I'm not from the Capitol!"

He narrows his eyes and stares at me for a solid twenty seconds before sighing darkly to himself and lowering the crossbow to his side. "Where are you headed, London?" he asks.

"I was hoping to find my way back home," I reply without thinking.

"Aren't we all," he replies ominously. "Well, good luck with that."

He turns to head back to the car, and I suddenly feel very, very panicked.

"Wait!" I call out.

He turns back around. "What?"

"Uh… Where are you headed?" I ask.

"The Capitol," he says. "They say it's zombie free, and if it's not I plan on finding some certain people- alive or undead- and killing them slowly and painfully."

Shockingly, I still want to get in the car with him. "The Capitol actually sounds like a really good place to head," I say.

He sighs, understanding what I'm implying. He fingers his crossbow menacingly as if pondering killing me now rather than dealing with me. After what seems like a thousand years, he sighs again. "Come on, London. We'll see how long you last."

I try not to seem too eager as I follow him to the car.

* * *

The mysterious guy yanks open the driver's side door and points for me to get in the back. I climb in, shoving my Glock and mini cooler in before me. When I get in, I'm surprised to see that there's a girl in the passenger's seat.

She appears to be only a bit younger than the guy- maybe about my age. She's really quite small, probably shorter than me by a lot, and she's wearing her hair in a long braid down her back. She has the same dark hair, olive skin, and gray eyes as her companion. In fact, they look so similar that they could probably be related.

"Who's this?" the girl asks the guy bluntly.

"London," he replies evenly to her. "Claims he's from England, where ever the hell that is."

She turns around in her seat and stares at me. "I meant why is he in the car, Gale?"

Gale— apparently that's his rather feminine name— answers by sticking the keys in the ignition. "When's the last time you saw a living person, Catnip?"

She sighs and sits back hard in her seat, arm's crossed. "Fine. He can stay."

Gale starts off driving at an incredibly fast speed. I quickly buckle my seat belt, but neither of them seems to be too bothered to do so. We drive in tense silence for a really long time, until I decide that I need to break the ice.

"So, I'm Har—"

"I don't care what your name is," the girl- what did he call her?- bites out. "I'm calling you London whether you like it or not. If I learn your name, I might get attached."

Her bluntness throws me off a little, but I still feel like we need to make some conversation. "Then what should I call you?" I ask. "I already know both of your names, but—"

"You'll refer to her as Twelve, and you'll refer to me as Hawthorne, got it?" Gale says evenly. "That good enough for you?"

"Sure thing… Hawthorne," I respond.

"Good," he says. And the conversation is finished.


	2. Chapter 2

I give up on attempting conversation with my new companions for about an hour. I focus most of my attention on the landscapes we drive by and how different it is from home, but I can't help but notice the piles of bodies along the sides of the roads. They're hard to ignore.

At some point, Hawthorne stops the car and hands the wheel over to Twelve. She drives slower than he does but a bit more recklessly. In the first ten minutes, she nearly runs off the road twice. The funny thing is, Hawthorne barely seems to notice. It's like he doesn't even care that she took out a stop sign and hopped a median.

I mean, it's not like there are any other cars on the road, so we're not in any danger in that sense, but she could still get us in a crash or something.

After three hours of silence, I get bored enough to attempt conversation again. "So…" I start out lamely. "I feel that if we're going to be in this car together for a while, we should at least sort of get to know each other."

The front seat remains silent for a few seconds. Hawthorne shoots Twelve a significant look and asks, "Do you recognize his accent?" as though I'm not even there.

She looks at me in the rearview mirror and replies, "No. He doesn't match any of the Districts or the Capitol."

"I sound like a Londoner," I interject into their conversation.

"God, did you hit your head or something?" Hawthorne hisses. "London doesn't exist. We have no idea where the hell that is. So give it up, okay?"

I sit back in my chair and absorb the blow. First, I have to face the idea that I may never make it home, considering the only two people that could help me haven't even heard of London. If that wasn't depressing enough, I then have to face the idea that I have no idea where I am now. The places they talk about… Six… the Capitol… Those names are as foreign to me as London is to them…

But I don't allow myself to get all balled up in depression. I still have my wand, which means I still have a chance to make it back home. This is the point in the story where it occurs to you that I haven't tried Apparating back to Hogwarts. Trust me, in the few weeks of my journey that weren't narrated to you, I tried Apparating a million times, but it never worked. Besides, Dumbledore must have chucked me here for a reason. Hogwarts must be completely ridden with zombies at this point. (I almost cry at that thought.)

To cover up my obvious emotional discomfort, I try striking up conversation again.

"So what do you two plan on doing in the Capitol?"

Hawthorne mutters something that sounds like "Jesus Christ" and puts his head in his hands, but Twelve just sighs and seems to relent to talking to me for a little why.

"Since you seem to have lost all memory whatsoever, I'll just highlight some basic background first, okay?" she asks, like she's talking to a child. "The leader of this shithole is President Snow. He tried to kill me, but I showed him up, so he hates me like no other. He's pretty pissed off at Ga- _Hawthorne _forreasons we don't need to explain, and we plan on destroying Snow before he gets to us? Are you satisfied?"

I sit back in my seat, mulling that over. I guess Twelve takes offense from my silence because she instantly whips around and glares at me. "If you somehow happen to be a spy from the Capitol and you're just going to turn us over or something, I will kill you if it's the last thing I do!"

The car gives a giant swerve, but luckily Hawthorne grabs the wheel and aims us back at the road. With his free hand, he takes Twelve's chin and turns her face back to the road. "Eyes on the road, Catnip. You almost drove us into a ditch—" he says. That's when we see all the zombies start piling onto the road. "A ditch full of zombies. Great job, Katniss."

She starts swearing under her breath as the zombies start to gain on our bumper. In a second, she slams her foot down on the gas and starts speeding down road, all cause for safety thrown to the wind.

Hawthorne reaches down to grab one of his weapons, but I tell him to stop. Maybe they'll be nicer to me if I gain their trust and prove my ability. "I'll get them," I say. I snatch my wand from my lap and roll down the window.

One of the zombies is surprisingly fast and is dangerously close to the back of the car, so I take aim and kill him first. Then, thinking quickly, I decide it would be better just to stun them all and get out as fast as possible rather than trying to kill them all, so I do exactly that. In one foul swoop, I stun the entire mob of zombies and slide back into the car.

"See, that'll take care of them for a little while," I comment. "Why waste ammo when you can just take 'em out like that?"

Hawthorne and Twelve are just staring at me in shock though. It's kind of concerning… And then I remember that they're Muggles. _Crap._

I swallow awkwardly. "You might want to get us out of here before they get up," I say.

In less than a millisecond, Twelve slams her foot down on the gas, and suddenly we're gunning down the road at about 120 miles per hour. I am thrown back flat against my seat at the force, and she shows no sign of slowing down for a while. I'm just about to shout something about not wanting to lose control of our vehicle when she slams on the brakes.

I almost smack into the back of her seat, but I stop myself.

Twelve turns around in her seat and looks over the top at me. I notice that Hawthorne is also looking at me… Or my wand, more specifically.

Hawthorne seems to be choosing his words rather carefully. "What…_ was _that?"

"What was what?" I ask, sort of hoping to evade this difficult conversation.

"_That_," Twelve points back in the direction that we just drove from. "How did you take them all down like that?"

I hold up my wand. "With magic."

Their jaws drop to the floor.

"I'm a wizard," I say, since I've already decided to share everything. "That's why I've survived this long, and that's also what I ended up here. Another wizard banished me here, and I can't use magic to get back. That is why you don't know about London, and I have no idea where I am currently."

There is complete silence from the rest of the car. I wonder how they're going to take this. I've heard that some Muggles don't take very well to finding out someone near them is magic. Come to think of it, I know this from experience…

Hawthorne leans back in his seat and presses the heels of his hands into his eyes. "I'm almost entirely convinced I've gone mad. Is this really happening?"

"I can do some more magic, if you need more proof," I say, sitting forward with my wand.

"Please don't," he says, batting my wand away with one hand. "I think we've had enough of that for one day.

"Okay," I sit back in my seat, arranging myself by the cooler once again.

We sit in the road in complete silence for a long time. It's even getting a bit dark by the time Twelve even starts driving again. The sound of the engine is the only noise for a really long time.

The sky has fallen into a sunset when Twelve says, "Thanks."

"Huh?" I respond, shooting out of a reverie.

"Thanks for saving us back there," she repeats, eyes still glued to the road. "Even if your magic was a little shocking."

"No problem," I reply.

She looks at me in the mirror, and I can tell, just from her look, that everything's going to be okay between us now. She's not going to be hostile towards me. We're almost friendly- not just a messed up gang of survivors.

We're a team.

* * *

"We're going to have to take turns driving," Hawthorne says once it's completely dark on the road. "We haven't seen a zombie for a long time, but I don't want to take any risks." He turns to the backseat, where I'm half asleep against the window. "London, do you drive?"

I blink at him. "Sort of… I mean, I never got a license, but I can drive a little."

"Good enough," he shrugs. "As long as you can keep the car moving."

"I'll even take the first shift," I say. "You've been driving for a long time, Twelve."

"Thanks," she says. She pulls the car over and we switch seats.

I buckle up, not wanting to take any chances. Out of the corner of my eye, I see that Hawthorne moves his gun across his lap so that he can keep a better grip on the trigger. Apparently, I haven't won him over yet.

I drive us off at a safe, slow pace because I'm worried I'll crash us otherwise. Hawthorne seems pretty satisfied because he doesn't yell at me to let him drive or anything. Twelve must feel pretty safe with me at the helm because she's asleep within minutes on top of Granny's cooler and the Glock 9.

Hawthorne, on the other hand, stays rigid in his seat. He obviously doesn't even trust me enough to put himself in any form of weakness.

I snail us along at 40 mph for what seems like a really long time, and Hawthorne shows no sign of giving into fatigue. I'm moments from insisting that I have no intentions of hurting him in anyway, when he looks at me.

He cocks his head towards the back seat where Twelve is sleeping. "She was my best friend back home. One of the only people I ever really cared about."

"That's nice," I say. I get too choked up to talk more because that makes me think about Ron and Hermione. "I mean, it's nice you two got out together. It must be nice knowing someone still cares about you."

He shifts his grip on the gun and looks back at her. "I've only known her for four years, but it seems like a lot longer… After my dad died… I thought no one would understand, but she did. Still does. We were in the same situation before all this."

He looks down at his lap and sits in silence for a little while, obviously not wanting to share more about his life. That's sort of when I realize I've started driving diagonally, so I course correct us back onto the center of the four-lane highway.

"She's like family," he says. "I always had my mom and my siblings, but she was just my family, you know?"

I do. I understand. I nod. "Both of my parents were murdered when I was really young. I never had a family until I went off to boarding school. My friends there were like my family… Like Twelve is to you."

The sounds of the tires rolling over the road and Twelve's even breathing become the only sounds for a long time.

"There isn't anything I wouldn't do for her," Hawthorne finishes up.

I can't help but think that might be a threat towards me.

* * *

_A/N: So, here's the second chapter :) Thanks for reviewing, following, and reading the first chapter! I was seriously convinced that no one was going to like this story. Let me know what you think!_


	3. Chapter 3

It's light when I finally stop the car. And it's not even to had the wheel over to someone else… It's because I see a car ditched on the side of the road with "HELP ME" written on the windows in white paint. It could be a trap to steal our things or it could be overridden with zombies…

Either way, I don't want to chance driving by.

"Guys," I say loudly. My voice sounds magnified in the silence. I reach over and shake Hawthorne's shoulder (he finally fell asleep around three in the morning. You can't resist sleep forever). "Wake up."

He and Twelve both shoot up into sitting positions with their weapons and start aiming around at the nonexistent zombies that are attacking the car.

"Calm down, we're not getting attacked," I say.

"Oh, god, you scared me," Twelve hisses. "Why did you have to wake us like that?"

"_That_," I say, pointing down the road a ways at the car in the ditch. "What do you reckon?"

"It looks safe enough," Hawthorne shrugs. "Besides, the people inside are probably already dead. Let's just keep going."

Twelve leans forward from the backseat and gives Hawthorne a hard look. "We have to at least try to help them, Gale," she says. "What if they _are_ alive in there? We can't just leave them!"

He immediately gives into her prodding. "Fine, whatever, but if that car is full of dead bodies, don't say I didn't warn you."

In sync, we all turn back to the Cadillac in the ditch. Twelve gives it an appraising look and fingers the Glock, but ultimately it's Hawthorne that says, "We'll send London."

Twelve instantly starts to put up a fight. "We can't just send him alone! What if—"

"He's got his magic wand-thingy, Katniss," Hawthorne says, annoyed. "You watched him take down that entire mass of zombies. I think he'll be okay."

She crosses her arms over her chest and glares at Hawthorne, but I don't let her fight back.

"It's okay, really," I say. "I'll go. I'll wave you guys down when I know it's empty."

Before she can protest some more, I open the door and slide out of the car. If this is what it's going to take to get Hawthorne on my side, then so be it. I will face imminent danger if I have to. I'm not roughing it out here alone.

I approach the Caddy with my wand out in front of me. I mean, it looks really abandoned, but you never know. The windows are tinted, so I can't see into the car, which means I'm going to have to whip open one of the doors. So I summon all my Gryffindor courage and yank the trunk door open.

Nothing.

I sneak around the side of the car and check out the front.

Still nothing.

The front of the Caddy is pretty smashed up like this person got in a few wrecks, but there doesn't appear to be much else of interest in the car. The zombies must have carried away the victims.

I walk back around the car and wave the Hummer down. I start to walk back onto the road when something smashes into my back.

* * *

When I wake up next, Hawthorne's head is floating above me, looking almost concerned and worried for my well-being. If the sunlight weren't already burning my eyes enough to make them water, I might shed a tear in thanks.

Distantly, like he's shouting down a tunnel, I hear him asking, "London? London, can you hear me? Are you alright?"

My voice comes out garbled. "Huh?"

I try to sit up, but Hawthorne keeps me pinned to the gravel that collects on the side of the road. "Hey, are you okay?" he asks.

Without thinking much about it, I reply, "No," because, really, I'm having a hard time remembering what just happened.

"Uh, god, that was not what you were supposed to say," Hawthorne mutters.

"Where's Twelve?" I ask, squinting my eyes up at his face.

"Keeping that crazy freaking kid under gun point," Hawthorne replies. "She's tough. She's got him under control."

But I'm left with my jaw hanging slack because I don't know what the heck he's talking about. "What kid?" I ask, trying to look around to find Twelve and this supposed kid.

"God almighty help us," Hawthorne mutters to himself. He looks back down at me through eyes narrowed in concern and says, "Are you messing around with me or are you serious?"

"I'm serious," I reply indignantly. "I have no idea what's going on!'

He runs a hand through his hair and shouts, "Katniss, he can't remember what's going on! Something happened to him!"

"S***," she replies. "Are you serious?"

Since Hawthorne's back is turned, I take the opportunity to sit up and find this kid that I don't know.

Some of the past few minutes floods into my head when I see him.

Twelve is standing a few feet from the Caddy with my Glock pointed at a kid, who's crouched in front of the vehicle's front door. He doesn't look even vaguely concerned at the fact that there's a gun pointed at his head. In fact, if anything, he seems distracted.

From what I can remember and what I'm seeing now, I can patch together that things went down a little like this:

_A few minutes earlier…_

_The Hummer idled up in front of me and I started walking back up the slope to the road. "It looks abandoned," I say, and that's when something hit my back._

_Suddenly, there was something pounding on my head, and it knocked me to the ground. From what I could tell, I was screaming my head off and swinging my arms around in an attempt to knock my assailant off. In the process of flailing about, my wand flew out of my hand and rolled down the slope._

_At that point, I thought the thing beating the crap out of me was a zombie, but I was incredibly wrong. When, I rolled over, there was a kid (maybe twelve or thirteen) screaming and hitting me with his eyes shut._

_So then we were both screaming and smacking each other and rolling around in the muddy grass, and I looked up the slope to the road and Twelve and Hawthorne were sprinting down towards us._

_The last thing I remember seeing was Hawthorne slamming the butt of his gun onto the side of the kids head. And then the kid's foot collided with my temple, and everything went black._

I take in a slow breath and knit my eyebrows together. That's not really a situation most people get to be in.

"Why are we holding him at gun point?" I ask loudly.

Hawthorne turns around sharply. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe it's because he tried to kill you?"

"He wasn't trying to kill me," I say.

"Okay, so maybe he was just trying to jump you," he retorts harshly.

I look back around Hawthorne at the kid sitting next to the Caddy. He's looking at me somewhat guiltily, but he still seems really distracted. I can tell that this kid would never seek to kill me or even steal all of my belongings. He was just protecting himself.

"He only did that because he thought I was a zombie," I insist. "Twelve, lower your gun. There's no need to make him think we're enemies."

Twelve shoots the crazy-looking kid a hesitant expression and then looks right back at Hawthorne for permission.

"Wait, wait, wait," he says. "Two seconds ago, you didn't even know who this kid was. How come you suddenly remember everything?"

I cross my arms over my chest. "Sometimes it just takes my brain a while to process things."

From his position on the ground, Hawthorne puts his head in his hands and mutters something about wanting to go back and kill me instead of picking me up. I look back up at Twelve, and she still looks reluctant.

"He's still dangerous, London," she replies. "He could still want to attack us. We really wouldn't know."

I get into a standing position and start walking up to the road to stand next to Twelve. She sends me a somewhat leery look and keeps a firm grip on her gun.

"I'm not going to make you put the gun down," I assure as soon as I'm at her side. "I just think we should talk to the kid himself."

Hawthorne climbs up the slope to stand next to Twelve as well. He's got his crossbow with him, which honestly makes me a tad bit scared to be near him when he's angry.

"Go ahead, try to talk to him, London," Hawthorne says.

I shoot him a look and take a few steps closer to the kid. The kid doesn't look at all scared, worried, or angry as I approach him. If anything, he looks a little bit pleased. "Hey, kid, what's your name?" I ask.

"No," Hawthorne says loudly as the kid opens his mouth. "Don't tell us your name. Tell us where you're from."

The kid doesn't seem frightened by Hawthorne's bluntness. He just stares into Hawthorne's stormy gray eyes with his big ones and says, "District Three."

"Makes sense," Twelve whispers to Hawthorne. "He looks like them."

"You're a long way from home, Three," Hawthorne comments.

Hawthorne's questioning techniques don't make much sense to me, but Three doesn't seem at all bothered. He raises an eyebrow and cocks his head to the side. "Well, so are you, Katniss Everdeen and her supposed cousin, Gale Hawthorne."

I almost start laughing because I'm so shocked, but Twelve and Hawthorne look completely untrusting now. "Holy s***," Twelve whispers under her breath. She fingers her trigger.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold up, Twelve," I say quickly. "There is no need to shoot him yet. We don't know anything about him."

I turn back to Three, and now he's cocking his head at me. "I don't recognize you," he says in his weirdly high voice. "What's with that funny scar on your head?"

I reach up to the touch the lightning bolt scar on my forehead and remember back to my old life for a few brief seconds. "That's a long story for another time," I reply. "It's you we need to talk about."

He blinks at me. There's definitely something weird about this kid. It's like sometimes he's off in his own bubble. Like he's not really here. Maybe he has ADHD or something… That's always a thought.

"You weren't meaning to kill me, were you?" I ask.

"Nope," he replies and flops over onto his side on the ground.

"You just thought I was a zombie, right? You were just trying to protect yourself?"

"That rock over there kind of looks like whale when it's upside down," the kid comments. Obviously there's something wrong with him.

"Three, answer my question. This is important," I say.

"Yes, I thought you were a zombie," he says impatiently.

I turn around to face my two companions. "See, there's no need to shoot him. If a human came up to our car, we'd beat him to a pulp too, wouldn't we?"

Hawthorne still seems pretty unconvinced. "What about the stuff written in the window. That seems like trap, kid. What's that for?"

It seems unfair to me to be treating a kid of no more than thirteen who has obvious mental issues like this. Three, however, seems completely unmoved. He flips himself over so that he's doing a headstand against his Caddy and says, "My sister wrote that in the window after the zombie ripped my brother's intestines out in the middle of the road. She hoped that someone would drive by and help us, but they didn't, so she and her boyfriend left a long time ago. I've been alone ever since, except for Jeffrey."

"Who's Jeffrey?" I ask.

"My imaginary friend," Three replies without hesitation. "But even he's left now. He was mad because we hadn't eaten anything besides dirt in, like, two weeks. I told him we'd be okay, but he ran off anyway."

Suddenly, I feel really, really, really bad for this kid, and the only thing I can think to do is take him with us. I turn back to Twelve and Hawthorne, and they both seem to be thinking the same thing. Twelve has finally lowered the gun. Even hard-hearted Hawthorne is looking at the kid with pity.

Three flops over so that he's lying face down on the ground. "My mom told me it was okay to have Jeffrey as my only friend because no one else was nice to me, but she died a long time ago, too."

_Oh my god._ I mouth to Hawthorne and Twelve.

Twelve visibly winces and steps forward tentatively. "What will you do now?" she asks.

He picks his head up and drops it on its side so that he's looking at us. "I'll probably just eat some more dirt. I'm getting pretty hungry." He licks the ground by his face.

Twelve immediately steps forward again. "What would you say if we invited you to come with us?"

He sits up in an instant, his eyes even bigger than before. "You want me to come with you? You actually _want_ me to come with you?"

"Of course."

And before we know it, the four of us are piling back into the black Hummer.

* * *

_A/N: Thanks for reading! What do you think of their new companion? ;) Let me know what you think._


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